[00:00:00] RACHEL ELAINE MARTENS: I think this is a five-star gold medal recommendation. I cannot wait. I’m really tickled that that’s one of the books that you recommended to me, and it’s so close to where I am.
ANNE BOGEL: Hey readers, I’m Anne Bogel and this is What Should I Read Next?. Welcome to the show that’s dedicated to answering the question that plagues every reader, what should I read next? We don’t get bossy on this show. What we will do here is give you the information you need to choose your next read. Every week we’ll talk all things books and reading and do a little literary matchmaking with one guest.
Readers, speaking of the information you need to choose your next read for the season to come, our sixth annual Fall Book Preview is happening on Wednesday, September 18th at 8:30 p.m. Eastern time.
[00:01:00] This is a really, really great reading season. Talk about an embarrassment of riches. There are so many wonderful titles to choose from, and you need a plan. Let me help.
Join us for our Fall Book Preview event where we will walk through some of the most anticipated titles of the fall season and some of the books I’ve read and loved, some of the ones I can’t wait to read. I’ve read so many wonderful books getting ready for this event, and I know I will continue to read so many good ones. I’ve also read some I haven’t loved. We can talk about that too.
I’ll share why I picked these titles and also offer tips to help you craft a reading life you love in the season to come. You will also get our 2024 Fall Book Preview, beautiful little digital booklet. We have more news on that front coming soon.
Members of our Patreon community and our Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club are invited to join us. That is a perk of membership in those communities. It’s a steal of a deal if I do say so myself. We are also offering our ever-popular A La Carte option.
[00:02:04] To get in on the action, which is such a good investment/pleasure for your reading life, visit modernmrsdarcy.com/fbp. That is for Fall Book Preview. Modernmrsdarcy.com/fbp.
Today, I’m talking bookish serendipity with Rachel Elaine Martens, who loves tapping into random delights of what’s available at her local library. Rachel and her family recently spent a year in Budapest, where Rachel relied on her U.S. library’s virtual collection plus a small shelf of left-behind books to source her reading selections. This limited selection led to some interesting discoveries in Rachel’s reading life.
Now that she’s back home in Missouri, she’d like to keep that serendipitous flair while also inviting more of an intentional flow into her book selections.
Rachel reads broadly and enjoys picking up her latest library discovery, but these picks can feel scattershot. She’d love to discern a clearer arc to her reading selections and feel less whiplash from constantly jumping between genres that feel like they have nothing in common.
[00:03:10] As you’ll hear, Rachel isn’t into the buzzy books splashed all over social media and the new release tables. Instead, she says she enjoys being late to the party instead of chasing down those new releases with abandon, because once the buzz dies down, she says she can read in peace.
She also prefers to read backlist books in a physical format because of the instant library hold gratification those books provide. I love this approach. Let’s get to it.
Rachel, welcome to the show.
RACHEL ELAINE: Thank you so much, Anne. I am delighted to be here.
ANNE: Oh, well, the pleasure is mine. I’m really looking forward to our conversation. Our team was really excited about the questions you raised in your submission, so thank you for completing that.
RACHEL ELAINE: Thank you. This is really a dream come true.
ANNE: Oh, that’s so kind of you. Rachel, we want to introduce you to our audience. Would you tell us a little about yourself and give our readers a glimpse of who you are?
RACHEL ELAINE: Sure. Well, I am currently living in Chesterfield, Missouri, which is a western suburb of St. Louis. My husband and son and I live our life here. I work as a freelance editor. I copy, edit, and proofread manuscripts for various presses, and I love to run and bake in my free time.
[00:04:26] ANNE: Lovely. Okay, I imagine we might be getting a little bit more into what it’s like having an editor brain as a reader, but I’m going to let that lie for now. Rachel, tell me a little bit about your reading life.
RACHEL ELAINE: I love reading books. I always have multiple books going because I like to read physical books, and I listen to audiobooks when I run, and then there’s usually an eBook on the Kindle app on my iPad just in case. I have a book with me at pretty much all times.
ANNE: I used the phrase security Kindle to my family when we were going someplace last week. They were like, “You don’t need to go find your Kindle to make sure it’s in your bag. You’re not going to have time to read.” I’m like, “But it’s my security Kindle.” I wanted to have a book with me. I could have read something on my phone, but that’s the worst.
RACHEL ELAINE: I will do almost anything other than read on my phone. No. I would rather just sit and stare at a wall than try to read a book on my phone.
[00:05:30] ANNE: I hear that. Tell me about your love for the library, which came through loud and clear in what we’ve already read from you.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Shout out to the St. Louis County Public Library System, which has been a huge, huge lifesaver over the years. I’m just about to the point where I have to declare library bankruptcy because all the books I have checked out are coming due before we have our summer road trip, and so we’ll be making a big return of books. But they have an excellent online system as well with the Libby app and the Hoopla app, so I try to work all angles of library accessibility.
ANNE: My impression is that it’s an amazing library system, and this is based just on talking with St. Louis area readers and also the caliber of events that they consistently host and that people show up for. It’s all just really impressive from a distance.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Yes. Now they’ve connected even more directly with the St. Louis City Public Library System, and so that has increased the number of books that I can pull from at any given time even more.
[00:06:34] ANNE: I just realized I’m conflating those. Okay, so you have two amazing library systems in the area.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, there’s a city-county divide of sorts, which can be contentious. But on the positive front, having two full library systems is only a benefit for me as a reader.
ANNE: Rachel, you mentioned that this was extraordinarily helpful when you were physically removed from your library for a time in recent memory.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. So from August 2022 through July 2023, my little family relocated to Budapest, Hungary for the year. My husband is a professor and he had a research fellowship at the Institute for Advanced Studies at Central European University in Budapest, Hungary. And since my work is freelance and portable and we have one wonderful son who was up for an adventure year, we moved our family just for that year overseas.
[00:07:30] We committed to not overpacking, not bringing a lot of books along with us. We said we will find books there. We had sort of assumed that we would find physical libraries there with English books. That did not happen. So I leaned very heavily on the St. Louis Library system to check out eBooks and audiobooks and that really was a lifeline while we were there.
ANNE: Rachel, that’s amazing. I am so jealous. Where did you all live in Budapest?
RACHEL ELAINE: We lived in the Raoul Wallenberg Guest House, which is connected to Central European University and it’s a quaint guest house in the Buda Castle District, which is a very historic district. It’s actually a World Heritage Area. We could not have had better housing if we had tried.
From one side of the apartment, we could look out and see the Danube River and in the distance we could see St. Stephen’s Basilica. You heard church bells every day. And then the other side you look out and you could see Matthias Church or Matthias Templum as they would say. It’s a gorgeous old historic church with incredibly colorful roof tiles. And so it really was like living in a fairy tale for the year.
[00:08:49] But one of the coolest parts about the guest house is that they had a bookshelf full of left-behind books. So they were books in German and English and French and basically scholars and visitors over the years who had brought books and couldn’t take them home or maybe they bought books while they were visiting, they would leave them behind.
So that created a little mini library situation where I could go to those shelves and see, Mm, what’s here. There were lots of very unusual backlist titles. There was no curation happening. This is just somebody had this book along and they left it behind, or somebody wanted to read this great classic and they read it and left it behind. Children’s books, really international flair.
ANNE: I’m so curious as to what this meant for your reading life. Now, I wonder what you would have felt about such a shelf had you encountered it in St. Louis. But you weren’t in St. Louis. You were an American reader with no easy access to physical books.
[00:10:00] You’re someone who loves physical books. I’m imagining this could have led to some experimentation. But I don’t need to imagine. Rachel, tell me about this physical bookshelf and what it meant for your reading life then.
RACHEL ELAINE: I really had assumed that we would have access to more English books while we were there and we just didn’t. So this bookshelf became the lifeline and it was, well, okay what books have I always wanted to read but never taken the time to read?
One of those books was My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante. That unfortunately was a miss. I took it with us when we went to Italy to visit thinking, Oh, this will just sort of be the pinnacle of reading experiences. And instead, I just didn’t have the emotional energy to really fall in love with the book in front of me.
But I would usually scan the shelves and try to see is there an author I recognize, a title I recognize or is there just a pretty book cover, and maybe I’ll give it a whirl. So there was much more of a sense of fun and adventure than I think I would normally lean into here where I’m normally requesting books from the library, picking up exactly what I want, when I want. So I was at the mercy of the mystery bookshelf.
[00:11:13] Anne, I should say that we had access to a wonderful selection of books at the CEU library. The building itself is spectacular. I would work there from time to time just because it was a wonderful environment to sit in the quiet with all the books.
However, they had a short checkout window and I, as the spouse of someone connected to the university, did not have access to checkout. My husband was more than willing to check out for me, but I don’t know, there’s something about having to add an extra layer of difficulty that discouraged me from using the university’s library system there. But they had a wonderful selection of Agatha Christie novels and other great books too.
ANNE: It sounds like you just took the opportunity to dabble in things you might not have otherwise.
RACHEL ELAINE: That’s exactly right.
ANNE: Okay. What’d you find out?
[00:12:11] RACHEL ELAINE: I found out that I can enjoy reading all different kinds of books that I would not have expected. I think I also found out that I really like the library access I have here in the US. I think it confirmed a lot of my suspicions that I’m a very spoiled reader who would not do well in a desert island situation without access to books.
ANNE: Well, I think coming back with some lessons learned and a renewed appreciation, I mean, that sounds pretty nice.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, definitely. I will always be thankful for that year. I think many of the books that I read will stick with me longer simply because we were in such an unusual setting. So, for that, I’m grateful.
ANNE: I’m so excited to hear more about those books. And I love the way that you approached your favorites. Are you ready to talk about your books?
RACHEL ELAINE: I am.
[00:13:10] ANNE: I think you hinted at the answer, but would you say how you chose these books to discuss today?
RACHEL ELAINE: I decided to choose three standout books from that year that we were living in Budapest. It would be impossible to pick three-lifetime favorites. And I hear guests on your podcast all the time say the same thing, that it’s so hard to narrow it down. So for me is saying, Okay, I’m looking at this 11-month window of time, I picked three books from our time in Budapest.
ANNE: I can’t wait to hear more. I’m curious if any of them are on the physical shelf. You can tell me as we go. Rachel, what is the first book you love?
RACHEL ELAINE: The first book I love is Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher. I found this book to be really witty. My husband actually had checked it out from Central European University’s library, he brought it home. He was cackling reading it at night, and I said, “Okay, what are you reading?” And he said, “You can look at it next.” And I did.
[00:14:08] It is an epistolary novel. So it’s a collection of letters written by a frustrated professor. And because I’m married to a professor, I’ve had an inside glimpse into the world of academia. And going through this book, reading the letters, reading the intensifying disdain and despair that come across in the letters, that resonated quite a bit.
It was just such a fun, fun read. It was fun to laugh. It was also a rare shared book win where both my husband and I enjoyed the same book. And I thought, Schumacher was really clever with her language without being smug. So that’s what I really appreciated about that book.
ANNE: It’s tickling my funny bone that you laughed as you said disdain and despair. Do you often enjoy these snarky, cathartic kind of reads?
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, I do. And I also appreciated that, you know, a collection of letters might seem random, except there still was an arc to the story. You followed the writer as his world unraveled. And so there was a sense of story even in just a collection of really hilarious and snarky written words.
[00:15:25] ANNE: Okay. What is the second book you love?
RACHEL ELAINE: Art and Faith: A Theology of Making by Makoto Fujimura. This book was extra special to me because while we lived in Hungary, we would sometimes receive physical mail, but we did not have access to Amazon within Hungary. However, one family member went the extra mile and ordered from Amazon Germany to send me this book for my birthday. So it was such a treat to have book mail in another country where we didn’t normally get almost any mail.
This book, Art and Faith: A Theology of Making, is a book by an artist who is sharing reflections on his life as a creator and also his faith. He talks about art as a form of creation. And really, he talks about how our creations are visible markers of God’s love and grace. And as a person of faith who also really appreciates creative works, I really thought that his reflections were profound and moving.
[00:16:32] And as a fun fact, I read this book on the weekend that the Pope visited Budapest. We had gone out early in the morning to join thousands of other people just to see Pope Francis visit the city. So that memory will be forever tied with this book as well.
ANNE: Was that a planned coincidence or just a coincidence?
RACHEL ELAINE: No, not at all. Just a coincidence. It was just a happy coincidence. But now when I think about that book, I’m picturing us standing in a throng of other people eating our little grocery store pastries, waiting for the Pope to arrive on his little golf cart Popemobile in a square.
ANNE: Oh, I remember eating really good grocery store pastries in Budapest. Is that because they’re amazing or because… is there another explanation? Please tell me they really are amazing. I remember some kind of sweet raspberry thing.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Actually, I would say there are a lot of cherry pastries as well. So cherry pastries. I think some of it is the whole… just the vibe. You’re standing in an ancient square, it’s open air, there are pigeons flying around, you could hear church bells. It’s the atmosphere. It’s the ambience. It’s all things pulled together.
[00:17:46] ANNE: I buy that. Rachel, how are you going to close out your favorites?
RACHEL ELAINE: The third book I chose from that year is A Patchwork Planet by Ann Tyler. This book was from that wonderful bookshelf in the guest house. The cover had caught my eye early on. The edition that was there had this gorgeous dark purpley maroon cover with a giant clock on it. And so in my mind, I had sort of saved it as, “Oh, I’ll wait and read that later in the year. I know Ann Tyler. That’s a famous author. I bet that’ll be really good.” And it did not disappoint.
I inhaled that book over the course of a weekend, which I’m a fast reader, but it’s very unusual that I would pick a book and then sit there and read it right away. I appreciated Ann Tyler’s really unusual characters. I felt like she had sort of a lovable underdog in Barnaby, who is the main character.
[00:18:49] There was an overall sweetness to the story because he was a rascally underachiever who is trying to reform. Or was he? Who knows? No spoilers. But I just remember feeling like I’d been transported to another world reading this book.
And because it was a lovely hardback with a beautiful cover, I could really enjoy the experience. It wasn’t sitting there trying to stare at my iPad with a new release that the library had sent to me as an eBook. Not the same experience as sitting there with the nice hardback edition.
ANNE: I’m so happy that you had this book waiting for you on that physical shelf.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, me too. There were a few books we left behind. And so I hope that future guests can feel the same kind of joy when they discover… Oh, I think I left behind the most recent Cormoran Strike novel that had been released because I had to buy that. I read the British edition and then left it behind for a future reader because you can’t bring back a thousand-page book in a suitcase.
[00:19:52] ANNE: I was wondering if page count might have had something to do with that.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes.
ANNE: Any other titles that you were happily paying forward to fellow readers, future readers?
RACHEL ELAINE: Actually, the other strategy we had is we sent books home with my parents when they visited because we did purchase a few books for my son while we were there and did not want to have to leave those behind. He wants to keep building his library here at home.
We were super disciplined. We really tried not to buy books while we were there that we couldn’t keep or leave behind in good conscience.
ANNE: As an adult reader, I understand that. And also I love that your child will look at his bookshelves and have those memories associated with that standout year.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. I mean, one of the books that came back with my parents was the most recent illustrated Harry Potter. I want to say it was The Order of the Phoenix. So he has the official British Order of the Phoenix illustrated edition as a memento from that year.
[00:20:54] ANNE: I hope you have some mementos as well, even if they’re not literary in kind.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, we do. I’m kind of ashamed to say I still have some packs of paprika that I have not used up that we brought back with us, but we do have other mementos to remember our year abroad.
ANNE: I’m glad to hear that. Rachel, tell me about a book that was not right for you.
RACHEL ELAINE: This was a big disappointment because I had assumed that it would be an easy win. So I chose The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd. The cover was bright and fun. I have read other books by Sue Monk Kidd that held my interest and were really enjoyable. Unfortunately, for me, the story lacked any characters that I could really root for.
It’s set on an island off of South Carolina. So a little bit of an unusual setting. There’s this ornate chair and a monastery. You have a mother-daughter element to the story. But there was a thread of romance that felt extremely self-indulgent to me.
[00:22:04] I found myself really dissatisfied by the ending. I can handle tough storylines, but if the characters are unlikable and nobody feels redeemable and everybody just does what they want instead of thinking about others, I tend to lose interest.
But I finished it. I kept thinking, “Well, surely now we’ll take a turn for the better, and surely someone will do something that is honorable and worthwhile.” And instead, nope, that one, I tucked that in the bottom corner. I didn’t go so far as to eliminate it as a reading option for others, but I thought, I won’t highlight this book as one that a future guest should pull off the shelf.
ANNE: I think one review that made me laugh described this book as the plot basically being like, there’s nothing like a little soulful adultery to get an intimate marriage back on track. And I imagine, from what you’re saying, that that’s not your vibe.
[00:22:58] RACHEL ELAINE: Correct. Yes. I think that review completely nailed it because I was just… I was very irritated for those characters. I tend to become fairly wrapped up in whatever book I’m reading. And so if I can’t root for the characters, then I’m just frustrated.
ANNE: Rachel, you are actually answering a question that I’ve been wondering about as you’ve been describing your books, because Dear Committee Members, you called out how relatable it was because of the academic world that it’s set in and your personal experience with that world.
In the Makoto Fujimura book, you really related to that because of who you are and the things that you care deeply about. You didn’t call that out explicitly on Ann Tyler, but my question is, tell me more about the relatability factor. Is that a make-it-or-break-it or is that a might be nice? What do you think?
[00:23:54] RACHEL ELAINE: I think that’s probably a make-it-or-break-it for me because the books that stick with me the longest are the ones where I feel very connected, whether it’s to characters and fiction. Or if it’s nonfiction, if I feel connected to the author, how they see the world, maybe an experience they’ve had. There has to be a tether in there somewhere for me.
ANNE: So I’m understanding even if you’re not like, yes, I condone those choices, you are blazing a trail that I’d like to follow, as in the case of Dear Committee Members. Still, the world they’re in makes sense to you and the choices they’re making to a point, and then you can forgive some creative license, some cathartic larger-than-lifeness. But I think you want to be along beside them in a sense?
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes.
ANNE: You didn’t want to go along beside the characters in The Mermaid Chair.
RACHEL ELAINE: Correct. In fact, I really wanted to have a stern discussion with several characters in The Mermaid Chair.
ANNE: You tell me you’re Rachel Elaine when you get in trouble.
[00:24:54] RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, exactly. That would have been a Rachel Elaine moment for sure. Yes. But in Dear Committee Members, I think the author was allowing her character to say the things out loud that anyone who’s been connected to academia for a long time would say they’ve at least thought in one moment or another. So that was a good connection for me.
ANNE: All right. We will take that under consideration. I feel like I’m writing a letter. Rachel, what have you been reading lately?
RACHEL ELAINE: Two books I’ve read lately that really stayed with me are Blessed Are the Rest of Us: How Limits and Longing Make Us Whole. That’s by Micha Boyett. It is a memoir of sorts, personal essays that are structured around the passage in scripture called the Beatitudes.
She’s a mom who writes with hard-earned wisdom about limits and longing. She is a parent of three boys and the youngest, Ace, has a dual diagnosis of Down syndrome and autism. And she shares with a lot of vulnerability and reflection about what it’s like to love and parent a child who teaches us about our own limits and longing in this world. So that book has really stayed with me this spring.
[00:26:15] Then the other book that I’ve been reading lately, it was an audiobook I listened to on my runs called Echo by Pam Muñoz Ryan. She weaves together three fictional stories. There’s also sort of a larger narrative that’s being woven together.
But these three stories are set roughly around the time of the Civil War. Two, take place in America, one takes place in Europe. And because it’s a middle-grade novel, you have children who are the protagonists. I really appreciated the way that music was woven into the audio experience. So you were hearing about this magical harmonica and you actually heard magical harmonica music as the chapters changed over and at different points of the story.
So that was just an overall fantastic experience for me. Even though at times I can be a little wary, you know, there’s so much fiction that’s set during the time of World War II, and I think sometimes I think, well, have we not turned over every leaf? Actually, we hadn’t because I learned new things listening to this novel that I didn’t realize had been taking place around the world.
[00:27:27] ANNE: Okay. That’s very helpful. Rachel, let’s recap, and then we’ll talk about what books we can send you on your way with today. So you loved, Dear Committee Members by Julie Schumacher, Art and Faith by Makoto Fujimura, and A Patchwork Planet by Anne Tyler.
Not for you was The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd. We talked about how that relatability factor can really make it or break it for you with the books that you love, and in this case, don’t. Then lately you’ve been reading Blessed Are the Rest of Us by Micha Boyett and Echo by Pam Muñoz Ryan.
You’ve said some really interesting things in your submission, Rachel, about what you are looking for in your reading life. And what especially jumped out at me is how you feel like you have a little bit of whiplash. You don’t have a kind of flow that you wish you did. That it feels, and I think these are my words, not yours, kind of like a jumble. Would you say more about that and what you’re hoping for today?
[00:28:24] RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Well, I think jumble is fairly accurate because if you look at my nightstand at any given time, you’ll find nonfiction books, and there’s usually a poetry volume slipped in there, but there’s also middle-grade fiction and maybe a thriller.
I think for me, sometimes it really can feel like emotional whiplash going from a very compelling, thoughtful story to then perhaps like a comedian’s memoir or something, just a totally different set of emotional connections for me as a reader.
So I would love for the arc of my reading to be a little bit more understandable. As I look back on a year of books, a great year in books, can I see how one book flowed into the next one instead of feeling like I just scratched open the next random to be read?
[00:29:24] I was thinking of those scratch-off calendars, which is not how books work, but-
ANNE: Where you never know what you’re going to get.
RACHEL ELAINE: Exactly. Exactly.
ANNE: Rachel, there’s not anything necessarily well or inherently bad about pinging from one set of emotions to another one, except that I hear you saying that feels discordant for you. And I just want to take a pause for you to ask yourself, is this something that you do want to change?
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. I think I do. At least for a period of time. I mean, even if it was six months with sort of a reading focus or a thread that’s pulling me through a reading experience so that I don’t feel like it’s, you know, gruesome thriller right into pastoral novel. There has to be a little bit of a better transition.
ANNE: In a sense, I’m reminded of my friends who care deeply about making playlists.
RACHEL ELAINE: Oh, yes.
[00:30:25] ANNE: I mean, back in the day, I think I really excelled at a mixtape. It’s not necessarily… Okay, to a point. You can understand what I mean by “to a point”. It’s not necessarily the songs you have, but the order that you choose to put them in that makes a mixtape work.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, that is true bookish wisdom because-
ANNE: [inaudible 00:30:48]
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, yes. No. But that’s exactly what I do.
ANNE: It was on Spotify too.
RACHEL ELAINE: It does because you can’t have a groovy dance beat that goes right into a slow dance song. You have to have a little bit of a shift.
ANNE: Yeah, it’s probably Brandi Carlile in my experience, but yeah, you do. I also want to point out as I was puzzling through like what feels discordant for you is that I think you have a lot of similarities in theme. And I wonder if there’s a way where recognizing the similarities in theme would make it feel like a smoother transition for you, or if this is and needs to be a tone question for you, and that’s the thing to focus on. There’s no good or bad, there’s no right or wrong, it’s just a question of what you wish to cultivate.
[00:31:34] But if you know what to look for, you will be able to find it. I think you’re reading lots of books you really enjoy, you’re finding them. It’s just a question of how and when you’re digging in and what you feel like you’re ready for at the time. Because, okay, hypothesis, you often feel like you’re not ready for the book you’re reading even though you really enjoy it because you were coming off of something else and you wanted to kind of stay in that neighborhood or transition more gently away from it than you feel like you’re doing now.
RACHEL ELAINE: I think you’ve hit on something there. Yes, the theme or the content in the book versus the tone of the book.
ANNE: Yeah. Dear Committee Members is a sharp but also gently silly satire written from the perspective of a disgruntled academic.
RACHEL ELAINE: Mm-hmm.
ANNE: George Saunders has written a lot of books along those lines, but so has Barbara Kingsolver. And Barbara Kingsolver doesn’t do snark. Like, she writes like soulful, emotional, earnest… Like, those books are talking about the same things, but they feel different.
[00:32:49] So if you were thinking, Theme is enough to make me feel connected, then you could move from Julie Schumacher to Barbara Kingsolver, and it would feel fine. But if you’re also looking for tone, then that’s going to potentially feel jarring, even though the theme is very much the same. Not that those are the only things that Julie Schumacher’s book and Barbara Kingsolver’s book are about.
So I’m simplifying this, for sure, to highlight my point, but that’s the difference between theme and tone as you’re thinking about, how can what I read next feel like the next right step and not, “Whoa, where am I now? This is different.”
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Okay, that’s really helpful. I’m tucking that away for future book selections.
ANNE: And you might not know the answer right away, but I love what you immediately volunteered which was, For six months, what if I did this? How would it feel? I love that question.
RACHEL ELAINE: I can always go back to my random book roulette if need be. It’s a good time frame to see what happens. I think six months is enough time to say, Okay, I rebel a little bit against a reading plan because I plan a lot of areas of my life and I want the reading to feel a little bit more serendipitous. But having some sort of through line I think would be good.
[00:34:07] ANNE: You referred to your love for gruesome thrillers. I’m imagining that at any given moment, like you might have a gruesome thriller on the horizon, but it’s not the only book on the horizon. I’m imagining that you also have a handful of titles in mind or that there’s a short list somewhere. So it’s not like this is my next book or bust, but that you can look at what you want to read right now or what’s waiting for you in Libby or what’s going to be coming available soon and choose from an assortment of what fits best.
It doesn’t have to be perfect. You’re experimenting. Just like, what if I prioritized a book that felt similar in theme or tone, as opposed to the one that’s… I don’t know. How do you want to finish the sentence? The one that’s due first? The one that’s the longest, shortest medium?
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Yeah, no, I think the sense of, oh, this is due first, that can be a lot of pressure as a reader to say, “I should read this quickly before it has to go back to the library. Otherwise, it was a waste having it on my nightstand.” But it’s not really a waste, it just had a little vacation in my home and it can go to somebody else’s home and then maybe return to mine at a future date if I still want to read it then.
[00:35:14] ANNE: I like that for you. As you’re deciding, like I’m noticing from the limited number of data points we’ve discussed today that you like stories. I mean you like to try things. Like you very quickly were like, “Six-month experiment, let’s go.”
But you like stories of people trying new things based on revelations they’ve had. And you like stories of people interrogating important questions and stories of people embarking on experiments.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, yes, I think that’s all true.
ANNE: In ways that you can be like, Hmm, what… okay, now I’m really pushing it. But hmm, like, what might that be like for me? And if they’re going down a road that you do not want to be on yourself, then that’s maybe not a book for you.
RACHEL ELAINE: Definitely. Yes.
ANNE: I don’t know where the gruesome murders fit in to that actually. You want to tell me?
RACHEL ELAINE: I think solving crimes and a sense of justice definitely. A recent development in my life is that I’ve become a court-appointed special advocate for children in foster care and that means that my job is to advocate… Right now I have a one-child assignment and I advocate for her in the court setting, in the family setting, in the medical setting.
[00:36:30] So I think the connection to gruesome thrillers is if there’s a detective who’s determined to set things right and solve a mystery, I’m on board. And I’m glad that I’m not actually living that detective experience, but that the case is being solved, the fictional case is being solved.
So I would not be as interested in thrillers where… something like, okay, The Trap, I listened to that on audio that was grittier than I would normally prefer and I hated the ending.
ANNE: I don’t know what The Trap is.
RACHEL ELAINE: Okay.
ANNE: Should I know this?
RACHEL ELAINE: No, I don’t think so. I want to say it was a story where there was a reveal within a reveal within a reveal about a missing person in the beginning. You start with a sister who is trying to see if she can lure her sister’s kidnapper to kidnap her as well. Like it’s very sick and twisted.
ANNE: Is this Catherine Ryan Howard?
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, that’s it.
[00:37:32] ANNE: Okay, I haven’t read this but my hairstylist reads a lot of books that make her mad and-
RACHEL ELAINE: Did this make her mad?
ANNE: We might have talked about this one.
RACHEL ELAINE: Okay, well I can understand why because I kept listening, kept listening and the very last twist was just infuriating. I won’t spoil it for you, but I also would say don’t waste your time.
ANNE: Okay. That’s really insightful to recognize. I have a strong sense of justice that matters in what I read. That is good to know. I’m glad you have that as a filter.
All right. So let’s take a look at what this all means. I mean, I feel like you do a pretty good job picking for yourself. Is that true?
RACHEL ELAINE: I have gotten better over the years. And I will give you a lot of credit because I’m a completist. I’ve listened to every episode except the two most recent. But I’ve thought a lot about my own reading life and about what works for me and what doesn’t and I’ve become less averse to putting down or stopping a book if I don’t enjoy it. So that has helped tremendously.
[00:38:37] I also tend to enjoy going and reading an author’s backlist. So if I find an author that I like, it’s easier for me to say, Okay, I’ll read all of their works over the course of a year and just slowly savor that collection whether or not it’s a series.
ANNE: Okay, that’s good to know. Oh, and Rachel, I just realized we didn’t hit on something important. You specifically said in your submission that you would really appreciate backlist selections that you can read in physical form. You said those were preferable for that immediate library hold gratification — Love that phrase. Totally get it — and that you enjoy being late to the party instead of chasing new releases.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, I do. I like the buzz to die down and then I feel like I could read the book in peace without anybody influencing how I feel about it. There’s also a little contrarian streak in me, which I’m sure is part of it just because everybody else is reading it. I will wait. I think that’s part of the equation as well.
[00:39:39] ANNE: Oh my gosh, you want the buzz to die down so you can read in peace.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes.
ANNE: I love that way of putting it. Okay, so the books that you’ve chosen are 2014, 2020, 1998. They’re all 10 years old. I mean 10 years plus. Not a coincidence?
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. I think not a coincidence. And that’s also true because you had books that were physically left on a bookshelf, who knows when, at the guest house.
ANNE: But they could have been left there in 2022.
RACHEL ELAINE: True, true.
ANNE: Okay. All right. So we can go newer, but older isn’t bad?
RACHEL ELAINE: Correct. Yes. There is a very distinct thrill when I go to the library and see, “Aha, they have four copies. Nobody has checked them out. I can pick this up tomorrow.”
ANNE: I love that. Rachel, I want to start kind of silly and then maybe get more earnest and on the nose. But because of your love for Dear Committee Members… shoot, you just said that you want the buzz to die down.
RACHEL ELAINE: That’s the thing.
[00:40:38] ANNE: But I don’t feel like I’ve seen this anywhere. There’s a May release. It’s a quirky office comedy. It’s called I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue.
RACHEL ELAINE: Ooh, sounds promising.
ANNE: The reason I’m thinking about this is because of a strong similarity to Dear Committee Members. It’s not the same. This is about a 30-something admin who works in a Canadian company’s regional office. And she has a lot of inner anger that it would be inappropriate to express in the workplace.
So the way that she has found a release valve is that she writes what she really thinks directed at the people she’s emailing, just, you know, very… placid work emails too. You know, the title comes from “I hope this email finds you well.” You know, just like blasé, blasé, polite, fine wrote. But in white on her white background at the bottom of her email, she says things like, deep in my core, I despise working with you and find you insufferable.
[00:41:41] But then once she forgets to white out one of her nasty notes and it goes out in visible text, not invisible text, and her emails have to get monitored. But instead of following through on that monitoring, what happens is the guy in HR accidentally makes it possible for this employee to see all her coworkers’ emails and IMs.
RACHEL ELAINE: Oh, wow.
ANNE: So you might have fun with that.
RACHEL ELAINE: I think so. The ultimate awkward experience. Oh, wow. Unfiltered.
ANNE: But do you want to go there? There’s no academia obviously. I think the thing that many of us might be able to relate to is just that simmering frustration that needs an outlet.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Oh, yes. No, I think it could be really hilarious, a perfect little release valve after a stressful week.
[00:42:41] ANNE: It goes horribly wrong.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yeah.
ANNE: Yeah. Reliefs that have gone wrong. I already mentioned Tenth of December by George Saunders. Do you currently have a literary relationship with George Saunders?
RACHEL ELAINE: I do not. I think this would be a new experience for me.
ANNE: Okay, I would not begin with Lincoln in the Bardo. I would start with Tenth of December. George Saunders was originally known for writing short stories. Tenth of December is a collection that has several stories set in the world of academia that are so snarky and humorous intake situations that I think you will find completely relatable.
And just as happens in Dear Committee Members, makes them larger than life and like takes you inside the mind of the people experiencing extreme discomfort in say like committee meetings. He just really highlights the absurd in these specific academic stories in a way that I think you would find really fun.
[00:43:40] And the reason I was talking about the classics is he also wrote more recently a collection called A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, which we have talked about on the podcast. This is where he highlights stories from the Russian masters, and they are included in their entirety because they’re now public domain in the book. And then he breaks them down and he says the way he’s approaching this is as if we the readers were students in his seminars at Syracuse University that he teaches to writers developing their craft.
So there’s a little bit of like that scratching that English major itch like, let me talk about literature in a super nerdy fun in-depth way that I probably don’t get to do in my everyday life. We’re not all book editors, but this maybe will be a pleasant change for you that it’s not that different from what you do on your day job, or… I don’t know. You can be the judge here. But I would start with Tenth of December.
Then if you enjoy that, move to A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, which is a short story. It’s very different from the ones he’s writing himself, but also interrogating those and learning to be a better reader, better writer, if you’re into that, but also just really having a lot of fun with words and what’s going on here and why does it matter all these years later.
[00:44:53] RACHEL ELAINE: Yes. Oh, I think that’s fantastic. That’s a great suggestion.
ANNE: Next I want to make sure you know about the 19… I think it’s 1980 Madeleine L’Engle work, Walking on Water. Is this a book you’re familiar with?
RACHEL ELAINE: I am stretching because it is less than three feet from me on top of a piece of furniture in my office. Okay, Walking on Water is very close proximity right now because it is a book I’ve been longing to read. I have a secret goal.
ANNE: I was wondering if it was too old that the library would actually have it available, but it’s within arm’s reach.
RACHEL ELAINE: It’s within arm’s reach. I bought a secondhand copy. I have a secret goal to be a Madeleine L’Engle completist and I’m a long ways away from reaching that goal, but I have been wanting to read this. If you don’t mind, tell me why you think this would be a good fit for me. I’m curious how this connects to the books I shared.
[00:45:51] ANNE: Well, it absolutely pivots off the Fujimura. It is a slim conversational memoir that many readers and artists have found articulates a lot of swirling ideas that they have about art and craft and creativity. And as she does in so much of her nonfiction, she’s combining insights from her own journey with masterful storytelling to make her case for art is something that is necessary and vital. She is writing here as a person of faith, but really making the case that we are humans. This is something that we need. I think she could get you excited about ideas that I think I hear you saying you’re already pretty excited about.
RACHEL ELAINE: I think this is a five-star gold medal recommendation. I cannot wait. I’m really tickled that that’s one of the books that you recommended to me and it’s so close to where I am.
ANNE: I did not see that coming. I think the fact that you picked that up at a used bookstore thinking, Maybe.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes.
[00:46:49] ANNE: Yeah, I like your instincts there. Also, I would like to add The Supper of the Lamb, that I recently recommended to Caleb Johnson on an episode that aired not too long ago, by Robert Farrar Capon to make a little trio of books that are all their own thing, but just are in a really lovely conversation together about making things as people for others.
RACHEL ELAINE: I love it. This is great.
ANNE: And then I want to go to two books I just realized just in this moment are both about art in a sense. I’m wondering if Mona Awad is a bridge too far or if she is absolutely perfect for you. Her 2021 book All’s Well is about Shakespeare and a college professor living with chronic pain, like debilitating life-altering chronic pain.
She is the director of a theater studies department at a university. She doesn’t have enough money. The school doesn’t have enough money. Her department definitely doesn’t have enough money. And she wants to put on a performance of All’s Well That Ends Well.
[00:47:58] She ends up in the position of putting on a production of Macbeth, which she does not want to do instead, because nothing is going out of her way. But then one night, she’s at a bar, three mystery men approach her and offer her the ability to do things that are a little bit magical to not only ease her own pain but, I don’t know, mess with the lives of others.
Awad’s work is a little off-kilter, delightfully so for readers who love her. I’m not sure it’s for you. I’m not sure it’s for you, but I’m not sure it’s not. I’d be curious what you thought about this and other books in her collection of work. Maybe one will jump out to you more than the others, but this is definitely in the snarky, not the earnest vein.
First-person narrative, very engaging. The relatability is giving me pause. But I think it’s enough off the beaten path that I want you to know about it.
[00:48:59] RACHEL ELAINE: I’m always glad to learn about a new-to-me author. And I think for the times I want to turn up that snark dial in my life, she could be perfect. So thank you for telling me about her.
ANNE: I want to close with Julie Berry’s Lovely War. And you know, Rachel, something that we haven’t talked about, but I know from your submission is that you are a heavy audiobook user. I think you said that you run marathons or training for a marathon?
RACHEL ELAINE: Yes, I am training for my second marathon this fall, but I’ve run a lot of half marathons and other shorter races.
ANNE: Okay, congratulations.
RACHEL ELAINE: Thank you.
ANNE: That’s a lot of audiobook time.
RACHEL ELAINE: It is. It is. That’s my treat time.
ANNE: And as you were describing the audiobook of Echo, I thought, oh, you need to know about Lovely War. Lovely War is a World War I story. But it’s not only that. It’s a love story. Also, she takes a tale from Greek mythology and makes it the structure for her World War I story about two couples falling in love in terrible times.
[00:50:00] This is a book that has delighted readers of all ages. It’s a little strange. The audiobook is great and has lots of the music reference in the text added to it in a way that feels perfect to the story, in my opinion, in many readers opinion.
So the story begins with Aphrodite and Ares walking into an upscale Manhattan hotel during World War I. What happens next is Aphrodite’s husband Hephaestus challenges her to show him what love really looks like because he’s a cynic and he’s like, “I mean, come on, is this real?” And she’s like, “Just watch.”
She takes him and the reader, us, as we look on, back in time to meet these four young adults in 1917, England. She’s showing her fellow gods to prove her point and win her argument, how each of these two couples fell in love and what they mean to each other, and why it matters.
[00:51:01] So this like, I’m sorry, why are we talking about Hephaestus? I understand how that sounds strange. And also, I think you will find it really compelling. It’s a strange narrative structure. It totally works. I read this in print the first time, but then after hearing about the full cast audiobook and the music element… because music is big in this story, one of the characters is a musician. And it really matters. And you think, gosh, I wish I could hear something, what that sounds like. And then it like, you know, comes into the narration.
And the full cast is so good. It’s Jayne Entwistle, Allan Corduner, John Lee, and… Dion Graham is one of my favorites. Julie Berry reads her own notes. I think there are more voices as well. I would be really surprised if this was not squarely in your wheelhouse.
RACHEL ELAINE: I will be checking this out ASAP.
ANNE: I’m happy to hear that. Okay, Rachel, we talked about a lot of books today. Let me see if I can recap them. I Hope This Finds You Well, the new office comedy from Natalie Sue. The buzz may need to die down on that one so you can read it in peace. But then again, maybe it’s on your Libby right away.
[00:52:07] We talked about George Saunders’ Tenth of December, specifically for right now, maybe later, A Swim in a Pond in the Rain. We talked about Madeleine L’Engle’s Walking on Water and Robert Farrar Capon’s The Supper of the Lamb. We talked about the works of Mona Awad, specifically All’s Well, and then we ended with Lovely War by Julie Berry. Rachel, of those books, what do you think you may read next?
RACHEL ELAINE: I think it’s an easy decision. I will be reading Walking on Water and hopefully checking out Lovely War to listen to on my next run.
ANNE: Well, it’s right there, ready and waiting.
RACHEL ELAINE: Yeah, ready and waiting.
ANNE: Thanks so much for talking books with me today. This has been a pleasure.
RACHEL ELAINE: Thank you, Anne. This is truly a delight. So much fun. Very helpful. You have a lot of insight into my personal reading life and I cannot wait to check out your suggestions.
ANNE: I’m so happy to hear it. I can’t wait to hear what you read next and what you think.
[00:53:07] Hey readers, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Rachel and I’d love to hear what you think she should read next. Find Rachel on Goodreads. We have that link and the full list of books we talked about today at whatshouldireadnextpodcast.com.
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Thanks to the people who make this show happen. What Should I Read Next? is created each week by Will Bogel, Holly Wielkoszewski, and Studio D Podcast Production. Readers, that’s it for this episode. Thanks so much for listening. And as Rainer Maria Rilke said, “Ah, how good it is to be among people who are reading.” Happy reading, everyone.